Journal of Modern Rehabilitation
Year:2013 | Volume:7 | Issue:2|Papers Count:10

Background and Aim: Hearing impairment in critical period of speech and language development is caused defects in oral and written language. The aim of this study is to use a test for comparing the reading skills of elementary fifth grade hearing and moderately severe hearing loss students in public schools.Materials and Methods: In this cross sectional study, 10 hearing impaired children selected from the total number of fifth grade moderately severe hearing loss students' community (public schools) based on the inclusion criteria and compared with 10 hearing children that were matched according to grade, as a control group. In order to gather the data, reading and writing tests for school students was used. Data analysis was done through SPSS-16.Results: The findings indicated that hearing impaired children on auditory discrimination skills (P=0.001), word auditory memory (P=0.034) sentence auditory memory (P<0.001), phonological blending (P=0.034), phonological segmentation (P=0.012) and text reading comprehension (P=0.044) were significantly weaker than the control group, but they had similar function in other skills.Conclusion: Children with hearing impairment have the same function in tasks based on visual processing to normal children, whereas, in tasks based on auditory and phonological processing are weaker than them.

Background and Aim: With regard to importance of the role of balance in performance of daily activity especially in exercise activity and necessary to identify the factors that influence the balance, the purpose of this study was to survey the effect of lower limb muscle fatigue on balance in elite young athletesMaterials and Methods: For this purpose, 15 young elite swimmers with a mean age and body mass index 17±0.7 and 21.62±0.5 during the two test phase, were studied. All participants performed the postural Stability and limit of stability tests in six for each test (three repetitions before and three repetitions after fatigue protocol by Wingate test) on the balance Biodex system. Values obtained by the system of the total, anterior - posterior, medial - lateral, anterior, anterior - right, anterior- left, posterior, posterior - right and posterior left index, were analyzed using paired sample t-test (P£0.05).Results: Results showed that fatigue caused a significantly influence the anterior - posterior, medial - lateral, posterior, left and posterior-left index.Conclusion: With considering the specificity of training principle, the results can be helpful in the design of exercises involving the lower limb muscles in the specific direction.

Background and Aim: In some disorders, word finding is difficult. There is different ways to assess naming process that verbal fluency is one way. So far has not been an index to verbal fluency assessment and treatment, the aim of this study was to determine normative data of semantic fluency for 18-69-year-old adult Persian speakers.Materials and Methods: This study was cross sectional and analytic. Participants were 540 normal adults 18-69-year-old. They were divided in 4 age groups (18-30, 31-43, 44-56, 57-69) and 3 educational groups (0-8, 9-12, >12). The peoples were asked to name animals and fruits in 60 seconds, words were recorded and analyzed whit Troyer method and SPSS 16 software.Results: The findings of this study did not show significant differences in semantic verbal fluency, clusters mean and number of switches between two genders. But significant differences were found in semantic verbal fluency (P=0.000) and number of switching (P=0.000) between educational groups. Also significant differences were found in semantic verbal fluency (P=0.014), clusters (P=0.000) mean and number of switching (P=0.000) between age groups.Conclusion: Semantic verbal fluency and number of switching increase by promoting the education but decrease by rising of participant age. Clusters mean increase by rising of participant but the education had not significant effect. Gender had no effect on none of them. The findings of this study are consistent with other studies and difference in findings in some of studies, could cause of different in educational and age partitions.

Background and Aim: Cerebral palsy (CP) is a neurodevelopmental disorder caused by nonprogressive lesions. This disorder produces motor impairment deficits in early infancy. Hand function is essential in performing activities of daily living for everyone, including individuals with cerebral palsy. Adequate first web space is essential for web space expansion, thumb abduction, and a wide range of thumb mobility and hand function. The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of C-bar splint on hand function and strength and also wrist and thumb range of motion (ROM) of dominant hand of 8-12 years old children with spastic diplegic cerebral palsy.Materials and Methods: The design of this study was before- after and quasi-experimental. According with inclusion criteria, 8 to 12 years old children with spastic diplegia from physical – motor special school at Tehran (8 boys and 5 girls), were studied. They used a C-bar splint (40 degree of palmer abduction of thumb) for 8 weeks (6-8 hours during day and 4-6 hours at night). In this study, hand function was evaluated by Jebsen Taylor Hand Function Test, hand strength by MIE dynamometer and thumb & wrist ROM by Goniometer. During intervention, they received routine occupational therapy program.Results: The results of this study showed significant improvement in hand function (P=0.001), and thumb range of motion (P=0.02). The data did not show any significant improvement in wrist ROM and hand strength.Conclusion: According to the result of this study, it seems that using C-bar splint can be an effective method in improvement of hand function and thumb ROM in 8-12 years old children with spastic diplegia.

Background and Aim: Many key problems in autistic children are related to executive dysfunction. This dysfunction is usually occurred due to structural and functional dissociation between brain regions. So neurofeedback can be used as a new treatment procedure in improving children’s executive function through modifying brain waves but behavioral changes are usually reflection of long-term changes in the brain level. Therefore the purpose of this study is to investigate the overall effect of neurofeedback training and behavioral effects caused by adding occupational therapy based on cognitive rehabilitation.Materials and Methods: Single system (A-B-A-B+C-A) design was used in this study. Participants were 2 children with autism spectrum disorder who completed 41 sessions during the study. They received neurofeedback intervention alone (B) during 20 sessions and in the following 12 sessions neurofeedback with occupational therapy (B+C). In this study, Wisconsin card sorting and tower of london tests were used for collecting information on children, s executive functions.Results: According to the obtained results, the effect size of neurofeedback training on executive function was high for both participants. The rate of shifting attention was improved as one of the executive function items after adding occupational therapy and also the increasing effect of neurofeedback in planning was maintained.Conclusion: The results of this study showed that neurofeedback can improve executive function in autistic children and the effect of neurofeedback can be more obvious if occupational therapy will be added. But gaining more significant behavioral changes after receiving occupational therapy needs more sessions.

Background and Aim: Knee osteoarthritis is one of the most common musculoskeletal problems that can affect activity daily living of patients. Many studies have indicated postural control deficits in these patients; but the effect of dual tasking on postural control has not been examined yet. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of cognitive task on postural control in the female patients with knee osteoarthritis.Materials and Methods: Postural stability in knee OA patients and healthy subjects (20 subjects in each group) in four positions was measured using the Force plate. Positions included double leg stance with closed or opened eyes with and without cognitive task. Area of COP and mean velocity (Vm) were measured for as static postural stability.Results: Area under the curve increased in the double leg stance position in the patients significantly (P<0.05). While mean velocity decreased by performing a dual task (P<0.05). The response to dualtasking was not significant between the 2 groups (P>0.05).Conclusion: Postural control deficits and increased of center of pressure’s sway were identified in participants with Knee osteoarthritis. Also performance of a cognitive task resulted in decrease of postural sway, but the dual- tasking did not change the postural performance of knee OA patients compared to healthy subjects.

Background and Aim: Some studies indicated that training in elderly persons is very important for decrease of aging changes. Many investigations have reported the increase in muscular strength as a consequence of training performed on the contralateral limb. There are few clinical trials that quantify the effect of cross training in elderly adults. The aim of the study was to evaluate of unilateral biceps brachialis strength training on countralateral peak force in elderly persons.Materials and Methods: A total of 12 elderly females (age=73.08) with no history of strength training and upper limb movement impairments enrolled in this study. Subjects performed unilateral elbow flexion exercises in dominant upper limb, using progressive resistance training three times a week for six weeks. After determining the maximal isometric force of elbow flexion, the subjects performed 3 sets of 10 repetitions of the 60-70% maximal force. The isometric force of elbow flexion were measured at the start and after 2 weeks by tensiometer. Paired t test was used to analysis the data Results: The results showed that progressive unilateral elbow flexion training led to an increase in maximal isometric force of biceps brachialis muscles at two sides (P<0.05).Conclusion: The increased muscle strength observed during training indicates positive effect of training in old adult. The increased muscle strength in untrained limb suggests the capacity of neuromuscular adaptation in old adult that it can be used in cases of limb immobility.

Background and Aim: One of the risk factors in sports injuries is inappropriate flexibility of muscles, which leads to pain, decrease range of motion and functional limitation in sport or daily activities and affects the athletes’ quality of life. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between flexibility of calf muscles and functional status of athletes with ankle injuries.Materials and Methods: Thirty male athletes with ankle injuries (mean age±SD, 22.63±3.94; range: 18-40 years) participated in this study. Ankle dorsiflexion of affected and non-affected sides were measured with a goniometer. FAOS (Foot and Ankle Outcome Score) questionnaire was used to evaluate the functional status of ankle.Results: The relationship between flexibility of calf muscles in the affected extremity, and total score of the functional questionnaire, was not statistically significant (P>0.05). While the relationship between the flexibility of muscles and functional questionnaire's total score in the non injured extremity was significant (P=0.004, r=0.51).Conclusion: This study revealed that although the athletes who have more flexibility of calf muscles, show better functional status of ankle; but there is not necessarily a relationship between inflexibility of the muscles and lowered functional status.

Background and Aim: Optic neuritis causes some deficits in visual function in the affected eye and there are some differences in these functions between the affected and unaffected eyes. The purpose of the study is to compare visual functions of both eyes to demonstrate the minimum and maximum value of affection in patients with acute unilateral optic neuritis.Materials and Methods: Thirty patients (23 female, 7 male aged between 18 and 45 years) who 22 patients with retro-bulbar and 8 patients with anterior optic neuritis, enrolled in the study and their affected and unaffected eyes underwent visual function assessments. Visual acuity (VA), contrast sensitivity (CS), color vision (CV), and visual field (VF) (consist of MA and PSD) were examined for both eyes of all the patients and the significance of the differences between two eyes were calculated and compared by Independent T-test.Results: According to our results, all the investigated visual functions consist of VA (t-test, t=7.29, P=0.00), CS (t-test, t=9.20, P=0.00), CV (t-test, t=-21.95, P=0.00), MD (t-test, t=5.29, P=0.01) except PSD (t-test, t=0.67, P=0.71) were affected by optic neuritis and there was a significant difference between the affected and unaffected eyes (P<0.01). The most significant difference were found for contrast sensitivity with letters (P=0.00) and there wasn`t any significance in the difference between two eyes for PSD parameter in VF (P=0.71).Conclusion: Considering the most significant difference of contrast sensitivity between affected and unaffected eyes in patients with acute unilateral optic neuritis, it is suggested to pay more attention to the test in evaluating, diagnosis and follow up patients with acute unilateral optic neuritis.

Background and Aim: The purpose of this study was to compare the effect of different types of isokinetic contractions on hemodynamic parameters in men.Materials and Methods: Ten healthy male subjects (age, 26.1±3.4 years) in three separate sessions performed three exercise protocols included Concentric/Concentric (C/C), Eccentric/Eccentric (E/E) and Concentric/Eccentric (C/E) contractions (flexion and extension) in the knee joint. In each session subjects performed 4 sets, 10 repetitions, at the speed of 60 degree per second. Hemodynamic parameters (heart rate, systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, mean arterial blood pressure and rate of pressure product) were measured before exercise, immediately after exercise and after 30 min recovery. Data were analyzed using two- way repeated measures of ANOVA.Results: Statistical analysis of data showed significant increases in heart rate, systolic blood pressure (P<0.001), mean arterial blood pressure (P=0.053) and rate of pressure product (P<0.001) during exercise and significant reductions in these parameters in recovery period. Rate of perceived exertion (RPE) was significantly different among the contraction protocols (F2,34=15.5) and post-hoc test showed that RPE was lower in E/E protocol than the other two protocols.Conclusion: Hemodynamic parameters change in response to different muscular contractions, though these changes are not related to contraction type.